Die Kommunalwahlen in Nordrhein-Westfalen im September 2020:

Abstract

To understand the 2020 local elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, the electoral results are placed in the context of past election results in the state to test the impact of structural characteristics of the largest cities on local electoral behavior . In a second step, the mayoral elections in the largest cities and counties (Landkreise) are added before including the coali- tions formed in the largest cities after the election . It becomes evident that while the Social Democrats have lost further ground, the Greens have seen a sharp increase in electoral sup- port . Even though the mayoral elections continue to be dominated by SPD and CDU, the Social Democrats win most frequently in the largest cities, while the Christian Democrats are the prevailing force in the counties .